


our veins are busy

by drphil



Category: Mindhunter (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, First Kiss, Holden’s anxiety disorder that has been forgotten about for 7 episodes, M/M, Mindhunter season 2 spoilers, masculine lack of communication, takes place right after the finale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-26
Updated: 2019-08-26
Packaged: 2020-09-27 10:19:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20406106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drphil/pseuds/drphil
Summary: There’s a knock that rattles the entire door. Holden disregards the blood racing in his veins, the dryness in his throat, and part of him thinks, I hope it’s the fucking guy.His fingers drum against the cool metal of the firearm, his vision is closing in. “Who’s there?”“Holden,” comes the gruff, agitated response, and the cloudiness fades away.





	our veins are busy

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Bill shows up at Holden’s doorstep after he returns to an empty home and....... you’ll see

The sharp edge of the countertop digs into the small of Holden’s back, but he’s only vaguely aware of it, eyes fuzzy with lack of focus where they’re fixated somewhere along the wall. The beer sitting next to his whitened knuckles is probably warm by now. The only audible sound in the apartment is the steady hum of the fluorescent lights, low and dim, glowing uselessly overhead. He’s long since switched off the television, can’t endure having it on any longer, can’t sit anywhere near it. He couldn't hear it over the static in his ears, anyway.

There’s a knock at the door, but it’s not abrupt, it’s more like the sound drifts into the room. It’s loud, it might not be the first. Feeling begins to flow back into his limbs as he turns to look, but he makes no efforts to attend to it. It’s eleven o’clock in the evening. It must be a mistake in apartment numbers. 

The knocking repeats again, more persistent. Even if it’s a mistake, it seems an urgent one.

Holden wills himself to move, wondering how long his legs have been asleep as he takes a tentative step out of the kitchen. Even in his haze, he’s impressed that he briefly acknowledges the empty feeling on his hip — answering to a suspicious visitor, alone, at night, right after a complicated and rather unsolved murder spree, _ and _ unarmed? — so he scouts out the suit jacket folded over the back of the couch, holster piled beneath it, not to regulation, by the by. But even as he draws the firearm out and tucks it instinctively into the back of his waistband, Holden cannot seem to find a single iota within him that cares about having it anymore.

As he reaches towards the handle there’s a knock that shakes the entire door frame. He disregards the blood racing in his veins, the dryness in his throat, and part of him thinks,_ I hope it’s the fucking guy._

“Who’s there?” His vision is starting to close in.

“Holden,” comes the gruff, agitated response, and he blinks, the cloudiness fading.

He hastily unlocks the door and swings it open, straightens up, and then he’s eye-to-eye with Bill, who looks like he’s just witnessed an onslaught himself. He’s got bags under his eyes, his sleeves sloppily rolled up, jacket and tie nowhere to be found. The way he’s breathing suggests he arrived here on foot, from Atlanta, despite the jingle of keys carelessly hanging from his pocket. He still fills up the doorway with his broad frame, but it lacks all intimidation, like if Holden so much as looked at him the wrong way he’d crumble onto the doormat. He doesn’t say a single word, just stares, blank and expressionless. The striking blue of his eyes is just gray and it gives Holden a fleeting deja-vu kind of feeling.

“Bill,” he says, nearly in an exclamation. “Are you alright?” 

No answer. Bill just pushes past him.

“What is it?” Holden follows him, barely closing the door behind them. “What is going o—“

Bill’s hands are balled into tight fists. He doesn’t turn around, but as Holden extends his arm to grab him, he bristles and says, “Fuck me.”

It comes out in a grunt, but everything Bill says is a grunt, Holden knows it takes a few more questions to discern fury from distress. “What? What is it?” 

“You heard me.”

Holden’s watching how his shoulders move with the depth of his breathing. The fog hasn’t quite cleared yet, it doesn’t seem like he’s killed the confusion. He swallows, slowing his pace, making an effort not to sound maternal. “Bill, is everything okay?”

Bill turns around at that, finally, Holden’s made progress, but then he grabs Holden by the head and kisses him.

It wasn’t so complicated, after all.

Despite the rush, there’s no derangement, no tugging or teeth-gnashing like Holden would expect: Bill falls still, his big hands curling around his ears, pulling him in so they’re shifting a little against one another, the overwhelming scent of aftershave and cigarettes flooding Holden’s dulled senses, the smell of leftover Chinese food no doubt treating Bill. But it doesn’t matter, evidently, he just holds him there, kissing him long, slowly, pliantly, fucking sweetly. Holden lets his eyes drift shut, finding himself leaning in further and further, though maybe not physically, and wonders if he’s still in the kitchen daydreaming. He feels just the slightest bit faint as Bill’s fingers trail under his jaw when he releases him.

His eyes fall on Bill’s face and he immediately feels guilty he didn’t react more, despite the justification of it. Bill’s hands remain on his neck, though, light like they could be snatched away at any time, but still lingering close beneath his collar. He pointedly doesn’t look back, bowing his head so his stiff, gray hair brushes against Holden’s brow, breath warm and heavy on his lips. Holden can’t tell which one of them is shaky.

“Holden.” Bill’s voice is too low to be blunt or stern or anything ordinary. It‘s resigned. Miserable. “Please, I—“

“I understand,” Holden says quickly, distantly, his hands coming up around him, mirroring him, but that’s as far as they get.

“No, you don’t.” Bill’s exhale is an empty, dark chuckle, his shoulders sinking into Holden’s hands.

Of course he shows no sign that he’s going to open his mouth and actually explain himself, so Holden brazenly tilts his head up, not allowing the foreign feeling of his unshaven stubble against his fingertips to sway him. There’s something in him that needs to see his eyes again, seek reassurance, an admission, a way to sedate him. Maybe Bill will see that he doesn’t care why, if this is the beginning of something, the end, if he’s just being used — he’s not interested in trying to understand that anymore. But just like Bill, he can’t find any words, and he doesn’t really want to, so he just kisses him back. Whoever this is, it’s someone else, but Holden doesn’t feel too much differently as Bill’s arms fold around him. 

The haze takes over, but it’s not so disorienting now. It’s fluidic, sinking, engulfing. It feels how Bill looks, he thinks. 

He lets Bill push him back into the door, dragging him under the surface.


End file.
